Good. This is just a slippery slope. What's next, father-horse dances? cat-son dances? I won't have any of it. Unless they start up a snake-Salma Hayek dance. Did anyone see From Dusk Til Dawn? It wasn't great, but not terrible. Parts of it were fun. If you can catch it on TV give it a watch.

cig-mkr:FTA: following a complaint from a single momIf the woman was divorced, the ex could have taken the child. (if he wasn't in prison)If she chose to raise the child single, she assumed the role of mother and father.

Well, that's the issue.

She wasn't allowed to assume the role of mother and father. Her child was prohibited from attending the dance.

Let's say, for the sake of argument, the child's father was run over by a bus last year. She has no father by no fault of her own (of course, when is it a child's fault she has no father, unless she personally killed him?). She would be prohibited from going to this dance. Saying "she could go with an uncle" doesn't cut it; he's not her father any more than her mother is.

Also, the ACLU merely sent the school district a letter which pointed out that the exclusion of the child was in violation of state law. The district's attorneys looked at the state law and they were the ones who said "Y'know, they're right. There's a law against this." It's not the ACLU, nor even the mother of the child who was prohibited from going to the dance, but the Rhode Island state law that said this was illegal.

Dow Jones and the Temple of Doom:I know this is insane, but how about if you don't have a dad, then you don't get to participate in the father/daughter dance? Just like if you don't make good grades you don't get on the honor roll, or if you aren't athletic you don't get to be quarterback?

There can be excellent reasons to exclude folks from certain roles. It's for the good of the kids working hard on the football team that the most appropriate quarterback is selected (on athletic ability and teamsmanship, hopefully). It's for the good of the school, the state and the nation that kids with intellectual ability are encouraged to work that bit harder to get on the honor roll, as their talents will be put to the best use down the track this way.

Who benefits from kids without dads being excluded from a frigging dance? No one. Just as no one benefits from black kids needing to use a separate water fountain or sit up the back of the bus. Promoting participation is good, even though this sometimes mean some folks miss out. Exclusion for no positive reason is horrible for those involved. It can be a tightrope to make these decisions sometimes (in the case of scholarships for minorities, for example, where some decisions appear to be exclusionary but they are for the overall good of the community), but the school here just farked up.

kiwimoogle84:Middle class heterosexual white men have the least privileges these days. It's like, if I want to be proud to be pasty, I might get arrested.

As a middle-class, heterosexual, white male, this is nonsense. We have the least overt privilege because the policies which used to benefit us directly have been rightfully stripped away to be replaced by laws which seek to curtail discriminatory practices. You would think for all of the subtle privilege we have amassed over a history of discrimination which has placed our families generally in better financial and education positions as well as culturally aligned with the mannerisms of affluence we would be less prone to f*cking whining.

Oh no! A black student gets a scholarship I do not have access to which was devised to increase minority enrollment and graduation rates considering there is no reason for lower educational attainment amongst blacks except for complex, interacting sociohistorical factors. I'll survive because, as Louis C.K. said, "I am not saying white people are better, I am saying being white is clearly better."

kiwimoogle84:cig-mkr: kiwimoogle84: jaylectricity: Farklee: jaylectricity: crispyone: Funny how none of you fartard liberals get upset about the schools in OR with drum bands with no whites allowed.

Who wants to listen to some honkey play the drums?

Of course your little tongue and cheeky gets a little racy. You think you are immune from reproach because who you voted for, don't ya?

I'm just making fun of my own race. The only race, I might add, that we're still allowed to joke about.

That I DO understand.

Middle class heterosexual white men have the least privileges these days. It's like, if I want to be proud to be pasty, I might get arrested.

But some of your friends are black, right?

Don't be hating on my drummers though. :)

Last time I said that on Fark, I got hammered.

What can I say? I live on the edge.

There is no hetero parade. There is no white history month. If I wish the wrong person merry Christmas I'll get sued. Yet there's a black history month and gay pride parade.

Yes, because it's well known that in the US, white people are openly discriminated against. In the past, racial segregation was practised. This allowed all the coloured people the prime seats at the back of the bus.

And gays have always had it easy. It's not as if their group has ever been discriminated against by WASPs.

Not saying that's wrong. But we've gone past equality, here.

Well, the reasons for gay pride parades and black history month is that those segments of society were traditionally discriminated against by the straight, white majority. Would you not get a bit of a buzz from being able to, having been denied the right by social mores, display your identity, openly?

You know, right before a lot of units deploy, they have Father/Daughter dances, so the soldiers or Marines who are leaving for 7 months to a year can have a night with their daughters, all spiffed up in their dress blues. They're a really nice event. The ACLU really needs to chill out.

Genevieve Marie:Those things are insanely awkward and awful. I had one at my high school and we all "strongly encouraged" to attend. My dad hated them too. We went twice, stayed twenty minutes or so, ate bad food and left.

This is kind of a relic of the nuclear family where Dad works as the sole breadwinner and doesn't really help co-parent, so you have to create this artificial time together. Good riddance.

My sister enjoyed hers and had a great time with my dad. wah. Seriously, farking wah.